"Maybellene" is one of the first rock and roll songs. It was written and recorded in 1955 by Chuck Berry, and inspired/adapted from the Western Swing fiddle tune "Ida Red", which was recorded in 1938 by Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys. Berry's song tells the story of a hot rod race and a broken romance. It was released in July 1955 as a single by Chess Records, of Chicago, Illinois.[3] It was Berry's first single and his first hit. "Maybellene" is considered one of the pioneering rock songs: Rolling Stone magazine wrote, "Rock & roll guitar starts here."[4] The record is an early instance of the complete rock-and-roll package: youthful subject matter; a small, guitar-driven combo; clear diction; and an atmosphere of unrelenting excitement. The lyrics describe a man driving a V8Ford chasing his unfaithful girlfriend in her Cadillac Coupe DeVille.

The song was a major hit with both black and white audiences. It has received numerous honors and awards. Soon after its initial release, cover versions were recorded by several other artists. The title is misspelled "Maybelline" on several releases.

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"Maybellene" adapted parts of the Western Swing song "Ida Red", as recorded by Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys in 1938.[5][6] According to Berry, Wills's version, an uptempo dance number, was his favorite song to sing at racially integrated clubs ("salt and pepper clubs", as he called them). Encouraged by Muddy Waters, in 1955 Berry brought to Chess Records a recording of his version of Wills's song,[1] which he had renamed "Ida May", and a blues song he wrote, "Wee Wee Hours", which he said was inspired by Big Joe Turner's "Wee Baby Blue".[7] To Berry's surprise, Leonard Chess showed little interest in the blues material but was enthusiastic about the commercial possibilities in a "hillbilly song sung by a black man".[7] Chess wanted a bigger beat for the song and added a bass and a maracas player to Berry's trio at the recording session. He also thought the titles "Ida Red" and "Ida May" were "too rural".[7] Spotting a mascara box on the floor of the studio, according to Berry's pianist Johnnie Johnson, Chess said, "Well, hell, let's name the damn thing Maybellene", altering the spelling to avoid a suit by the cosmetic company. The lyrics were rewritten, also at the direction of Chess. "The kids wanted the big beat, cars and young love," Chess recalled. "It was the trend and we jumped on it."[7]

It has been asserted that it was a common practice in the 1950s to alter the instrumental parts and lyrics of old songs and represent them as new songs. With such changes the original songs were often not identifiable, particularly if the melody was modified. This practice took place because copyrights on older recordings were rarely asserted.

As Chess had predicted, the lyrics appealed to teenagers fascinated by cars, speed and sexuality. "Maybellene" was one of the first records to be a hit on the rhythm and blues, country and western, and pop charts. Featuring some inimitable Chuck Berry riffs, some blues-style picking on a guitar and Johnson's piano, which added a hummable rhythm to the steady backbeat, "Maybellene" was a pivotal song in the emergence of rock and roll. This exciting fusion of a rhythm-and-blues beat with a rural country style was the catalyst for the emergence of rock and roll in the mid-1950s.[8]

In the 1950s, some record companies assigned publishing credits to disc jockeys and others who helped to promote a record, a form of payola by means of composer royalties. For this reason, the disc jockey Alan Freed received credit as a co-writer of "Maybellene". Robert Christgau's October 1972 essay on Chuck Berry suggests this was the case for Freed's publishing credit. Leonard Chess, in Christgau's words, "flipped" for Berry's "Maybellene" and "forwarded it to Alan Freed." "Having mysteriously acquired 25 percent of the writer's credit," Christgau writes, "Freed played 'Maybellene' quite a lot, and it became one of the first nationwide rock and roll hits."[9]

Russ Fratto, who had loaned money to Chess, also received credit.[10] (Some Chess insiders have said that Chess owed money to Fratto, a printer and stationer, for producing record labels. Other accounts describe Fratto as "a record distributor.") The Freed and Fratto credits, which do not appear on the original Chess single (see the photograph above), were withdrawn in 1986.[11] However, as of 2014, these credits still appear on some reissues of Berry's recordings.

The first edition of Charlie Gillett's The Sound of the City: The Rise of Rock and Roll in 1970 erroneously identifies Russ Fratto as a disc jockey and suggests that both Alan Freed and Fratto were present at the recording session in Chicago in May 1955.[12]

Bruce Pegg's Brown Eyed Handsome Man on the life and recording career of Chuck Berry identifies Russ Fratto as the owner of Victory Stationery, a print shop next door to 4750 South Cottage Grove, the location of the first offices of Chess Records. Pegg identifies Victory Stationery's owner Russ Fratto as "4750's landlord."[13]

In an interview with Patrick William Salvo for Rolling Stone published in November 1972, Chuck Berry told Salvo that Alan Freed "didn't sit down with me at all and write anything." "He [Freed] got that money solely for doing us some favors in those days," Berry told Salvo.[14]

In 1955, the song, a 12-bar blues, peaked at number five on the Billboard pop chart and was number one on the R&B chart.[15]Billboard's year-end charts in 1955 ranked "Maybellene" number 3 on the Top R&B Records Retail Sales and Juke Box Plays charts.[16]

Columbia records released a version by Marty Robbins (21351) by the end of August 1955.[23] His version was the number 13 "Most Played by Jockeys" in the country-and-western market by mid-October.[24] and soon Columbia was touting it as one of its "Best Selling Folk Records".[25] By November, it was noted that the record had "won considerable pop play".[26] Other versions available in mid-October 1955 were by J. Long (Coral 61478), J. Lowe (Dot 15407), and R. Marterie (Mercury 70682) with the song listed as number 14 top selling in the nation.[27]